PUBLIC LIVES

By JAMES BARRON with Elisabeth Bumiller

Published: August 31, 2000

The chef EBERHARD MULLER said he decided that if the restaurant would not move, he would.

And so Mr. Muller, who took over from ANDRE SOLTNER at Lutece six years ago, is leaving to become a partner in Bayard's, at 1 Hanover Square, near Pearl Street. He will also be the executive chef.

Mr. Soltner spent 34 years at Lutece, and when he sold it to Ark Restaurants and Mr. Muller was hired, the dining room was spruced up, the garden room was restuccoed, the trellis repainted. But Lutece remained at 249 East 50th Street.

''Ark bought this restaurant to gain notoriety for themselves,'' Mr. Muller said. ''That's a legitimate way of doing things. But in my mind, I always felt Lutece needed to take another step, needed to get out of this old-fashioned mode.

''I kept proposing, move the restaurant. Le Cirque did it, La Cote Basque did it, Daniel did it. The facilities at Lutece are totally inadequate for what a restaurant of its caliber ought to be.

''I was led to believe in the beginning that this was what we were planning on doing, and it never materialized.''

(MICHAEL WEINSTEIN, who owns Ark Restaurants, did not return a call for comment yesterday.)

Art Auction To Aid Democrats

VICE PRESIDENT AL GORE did not invent the Internet, but his daughter KARENNA GORE SCHIFF and the photographer CHUCK CLOSE are promoting an online auction that could raise $1 million for the Democratic National Committee.

They appeared at Leftbid, a Madison Avenue gallery, where two giant portraits of the vice president, one in color, the other in black and white, were on the walls.

Mr. Close, who took the pictures, said the vice president was a pleasant subject. ''He's amazingly not at all vain,'' Mr. Close said.

Would-be buyers will pay $1,000 to be able to take part in the sale, with $500 going toward a purchase. More than 1,500 works from more than 75 artists, including ANNIE LEIBOVITZ, CHRISTO, CLAES OLDENBURG, YOKO ONO, LARRY RIVERS, ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG, JAMES ROSENQUIST and ANDY WARHOL, will be sold.

In a conversation later in the day yesterday, Mr. Close explained why the online fund-raiser was not one fund-raiser too many.

''This is not going to the same old sources,'' he said. A moment later, he added, ''I just give artists' work away with no tax deduction whatsoever. This is real philanthropy.

''When an artist ponies up a work -- and we're talking works that could be $50,0000, $60,000 -- I think it's a much cleaner way of raising funds. It's not a special-interest group, it's a collection of individuals, each with their own reason to do it.''

Don't Alienate The Rat Vote

MAYOR RUDOLPH W. GIULIANI caught a mouse in his City Hall office yesterday, ''a pretty fat mouse,'' he said. The way he said it, the word ''pretty'' seemed to apply to the mouse's size, not its appearance. Then he went to the Ed Sullivan Theater, where DAVID LETTERMAN has been joking about ''rats as big as cats'' since he moved in nearly seven years ago.

At ''Late Show With David Letterman'' last night, the talk turned to rodents. ''Some of these rats are registered voters,'' Mr. Letterman told the mayor, ''so be careful.''

Gobble, Gobble: Ex-Met's Secret

If only ROGER CEDENO still played for the Mets.

Monday, Mr. Cedeno, now a Houston Astro outfielder, dined at Calidad Latina on Ninth Avenue, where he often ate when he was on the Shea team. VICTOR AQUINA, a waiter, was pleased to see him again. TONY ESCIBIO, whose 24-game hitting streak was the longest in Astro history, was with him. ''I said, if you take the chicken, you hit the home run,'' Mr. Aquina said. ''He used to come in a lot and have the chicken and hit a home run or at least a triple.''

So Mr. Cedeno had the chicken. And on Monday, he led off with a home run.

JAMES BARRON with Elisabeth Bumiller

Photo: EBERHARD MULLER

Correction: September 7, 2000, Thursday A report in the Public Lives column last Thursday about the return of Roger Cedeno, the Houston Astros outfielder, to Calidad Latina, a Manhattan restaurant he frequented when he played for the Mets, misspelled the surname of the Houston teammate who joined him. He is Tony Eusebio, not Escibio.